Presenting the new structure

The first question that came to my mind when I was supposed to introduce a new structure to the learners was whether this structure is actually introduced to them for the first time, or perhaps they had some contact with it previously and they possess not only their own ideas and hypotheses about it, but also those communicated to them by others, usually previous teachers or the authors of the coursebooks, from which the learners tried to learn English independently. Thus, I thought that it might be useful to ask the learners about it. Initially, I was asking the learners in all the groups if they were taught this structure previously. Most adults and all the adolescents were able to give me a satisfactory answer. The biggest problem was with the young learners from group #1, since they rarely knew the English or names of the tenses or their Polish translations.

Additionally, some adults had finished their education a longer while ago and they simply did not remember what they did in their school years. Such approach to asking the learners about their already acquired knowledge turned out to have one more shortcoming. I assumed wrongly that the fact of knowing or not knowing the structure is equal with, respectively, understanding and not understanding it. The truth proved itself to be quite different, since the learners sometimes had a good understanding of the structure’s use without declaring any previous knowledge of it or, conversely, they had no idea about the correct use of the structure even though they were taught about it. I decided to employ a different strategy and started to ask learners what they think is the use of a given structure. That way I could account for their expectations and hypotheses as well as for the previously acquired knowledge. Obviously, it was very often that I got no answer, especially from the younger learners, but the situation was much clearer and enabled me to build upon the learners’ existing knowledge and ideas where possible, while only clarifying the issues about which the learners’ perceptions were faulty. I employed this approach during all the following lessons in all the groups.

Obviously, it is not only the knowledge of the given structure that can be used as foundation for the new information during the introduction. When introducing the new structures, I often referred to the previously learned structures of English and sometimes I made comparisons with Polish grammar. Such reference had the best effects with the

adult learners, who often got engaged in the presentation and wanted to clarify everything that was not totally understood by them or to test their own hypotheses. On the other hand, young learners were almost totally disinterested with the provided reference and they wanted to move straight to the exercises, downplaying explanations as well. This was rather annoying for me, especially since they were asking a lot of questions when doing the exercises, and during several next lessons I refused to change my attitude, trying to keep their attention on the introduction and explanations. This, however, turned out to be counter-productive, since I was spending the lesson time on the introduction to which they paid little attention, if any at all. Eventually I abandoned the introduction stage, made the explanations as short as possible and proceeded to the exercises, answering the questions of the learners when they appeared. The main problem with that strategy was that very often I had to repeat my explanations to each of the learners separately, since they were concentrating on the exercise and not on the explanations. Nevertheless, during the course of the study I did not manage to devise a more efficient strategy.

As for the adults and adolescents, I tried to make use of as much of their existing knowledge as possible. For example, during the lessons with groups #3, #4, #5 and #6, when I was introducing Past Continuous tense, I always explained to the learners that in terms of form it is exactly the same as Present Continuous, except for the conjugation of the verb “to be” which is conjugated in its past form, and not the present one, and that it uses different adverbs of time, for obvious reasons. Most of them had no problems with remembering the form of Past Continuous, so although I cannot be totally certain, I believe that introducing the new material with such reference to previous knowledge facilitated their understanding. Additionally, the whole introduction rarely took longer than three minutes and required very little preparation on my part. The only obstruction happened during the lesson with the learner from group #5. I am not sure whether he misunderstood my explanations (although it was provided in both L1 and L2) or just developed a confusing association in his mind, but he very often conjugated the “to be”

verb in Present Simple instead of the Past Simple, which resulted in forming sentences in Present Continuous instead of Past Continuous. Nevertheless, this was a single case and after a certain amount of drills he learned to use both those tenses in correct contexts.

There were also situations when I referred to the similarities and differences between the two languages. For example, when introducing Present Perfect tense in

groups #4, #5 and #6 I underlined that this tense is usually expressed in Polish through Past Tense which, however, expresses also the meaning of English Past Simple. I wanted to make learners conscious that what is expressed by one tense in Polish might bed divided into two tenses in English, each appearing in a particular context. Such reference seemed to interest mostly learners from groups #4 and #6, who expressed linguistic curiosity during most of the lessons, whereas the learner from group #5 listened to it, but it did not seem to help him reach better accuracy in the use of newly learned tenses. Contrastively, learners from group #4 and #6 performed much better during the exercises and seemed to use the reference I provided to expand their own knowledge of the phenomenon of language and use it to form their own hypotheses. I make this assumption basing on the fact that their participation in the lesson increased after several such lessons and the questions that they asked concerning the newly introduced structures were becoming more and more complex.

Nevertheless, referring to the previously acquired knowledge was not the only way in which I tried to facilitate learners understanding of the new syntactic structures. I also tried to provide some less abstract means in order to fulfill this aim. Sometimes, when introducing the use of a new structure, I tried to show its meaning by simply acting it out its examples or describing the context in which it would be used. This was extremely useful when I was comparing two tenses referring to the similar space of time, such as Past Simple and Past Continuous. Conversely, it was not necessary to provide a lot of context in order to describe the difference between Present Simple and Past Simple, since all the explanation required at that point of the course was limited to the difference between the present and the past, which is rather obvious for most people.

When it comes to acting out the meaning of examples of a particular structure, I did it mostly in the classroom context. The main reason for this was the simple fact, that in the classroom I was already standing and moving, so the transition from some verbal introduction to the visual demonstration was smooth and natural, while during private lessons I was usually seated at a table with the learner(s), so any action would require a sort a disruption that I preferred to avoid. Additionally, I think I would not feel comfortable enough interacting with the objects in the learner’s home, in contrast to the classroom setting, which is my ‘territory’.

As an example of this technique’s use, I would like to refer to the lesson with group #4 when I was introducing Present Perfect to the learners, who already knew Present Simple, Present Continuous, Past Simple and Past Continuous. I used this

opportunity to revise the use of those tenses, showing a whole chain of comments concerning the activity of opening the door using the listed tenses. This introductory activity was based on the example of an ‘advance organizer’ presented by Marton (1979). First I went to the door and slowly opened it, saying “I am opening the door”

during the activity, “I have opened the door” just after it and then I told the students to imagine that an hour passed and I said “I opened the door an hour ago”. Then I asked them about their definition of the contexts I used the three tenses in (the two of which they were already supposed to know). Their idea was very close to the factual one and I only had to clarify some matters after moving on to the explanation stage.

In situations when acting out the use of a particular structure would be uncomfortable or simply difficult, I often preferred to give learners detailed description of the contexts in which a particular structure would be used. I used this technique also during explanations and when correcting their mistakes during exercises, but I assumed it would be useful also at the very beginning of the lesson while presenting the new structure. During the observation study I used this technique usually with slightly more advanced learners, since the use of the structures presented to beginner rarely allowed for ambiguities. However, it was already useful to some extent at the point of showing the difference between Present Simple and Present Continuous when I was introducing the latter to the learners from groups #2 and #3. At the beginning of the lesson I told them that Present Continuous is used to describe actions done at the point of speaking as well as plans for the future, in contrast to Present Simple which is usually used to speak about things done in habitual manner. I explained that this is the reason they should not say “I take out garbage” when they are doing it at the moment of speaking, since their interlocutor might understand that this is their job or hobby. I also told them that, on the other hand, saying “I am working in a bank” when asked about their job during a conversation in the middle of the forest would probably not be understood as the description of their current action, but nevertheless it would be much more proper if they said “I work in a bank”.

Because of its humouristic aspect, this technique proved to be extremely successful, since even after several lessons the learners remembered the ‘funny’

meaning that they should avoid. Additionally, it definitely helped to create a more relaxed atmosphere during the classes and I must admit that I enjoyed the creation of humouristic meaning and contrasting it with the proper one. What is more, it showed the

learners that even grammar has its entertaining aspect which can be explored during the lessons and does not have to be dull and boring.

It is worth noting that the positive feedback to my aims at fostering the learners’

understanding of L2 and language in general encouraged me to further experimentation in this matter and implementation of new techniques in the introduction of new syntactic structures, whereas lack of response and indifference on part of the learners was rather frustrating. Nevertheless, I am quite convinced that even if only one group encouraged me to develop my techniques of introduction, I would still do it, since it was very rewarding.